JUVENILE EMPLOYMENT.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIX, Issue 5361, 7 December 1928, Page 4

JUVENILE EMPLOYMENT.

EFFORT TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM. EDUCATION DEPARTMENT’S MOVE. With the ‘approaching end qf the school year the Education Department has issued a new edition of the pamphlet published last year, on the subject of “Vocational Guidance." It may be doubted whether the mere issue of printed matter on the important question 'of juven’ile employment will advance the opinion of this problem. Co-ordinated with a practical scheme for merging the youpg employables into the economic life of the country, however, the data captained therein might be found valuable and useful.

In general, the future avocation of the boys and girls who attain the leaving age i.s a matter of individual choice, usually determined in family council. At the same time there is always the probability that the avenue selected may be overcrowded. There have been serious complaints that boys desiring to become apprenticed to skilled trades have been unable to find openings.

This difficulty arises chiefly from the restrictions impeded! by industrial awards, and a disinclination on the part of sqme employers to be bothered! with the training of apprentices. It was 1 anticipated that the Apprenticeship Committees con-, stituted some time ago to establish contact between supply and demand in juvenile employment would find means of removing some of the diiffi culties of the problem, but these ex l pectations have not been realised. Apprenticeship, however, is only part of the problem. Apart from the

skilled trades there is no established machinery for bringing employers and juvenile candidates into contact. Something, has been accomplished in this direction by voluntary organisations, notably in the Canterbury district. Throughout the country, also, one hears of headmasters who have taken a personal interest, in co-opera-tion .with the parents, in endeavouring to place leaving pupils in positions suitable to their individual dispositions and attainments.

A reference tq the last annual report of the Minister ot Education tfhows that some attempt is made to keep track of the future movements of the pupils after, leaving schooj According to the figures given, of the 9277 boys who passed Standard: VI. in 1927, 5857 went forward to postprimary sc'hoqls; the other boys and girls, respectively, went into the following avenues: Commercial, 447, 269 ; trades, '554, 72 ; agricultural and pastoral, 1284, 125.

It 'is clear, however, that these figures can only be approximate. Further, they are c,onfined to those who, leave the primary schools. Is any track kept of those who passi out from the secondary sc’hoqls ? What is really required are juvenile employment bureaux, which .will provide reliable information, in classified lists, as to the state of the demand for. young people in all avenues qf service, and similar, lists of the existing supply.

It has been said, and quite truly, that education according to modern principles is a preparation for rather, than for special avocations. But there comes a stage in a pupil’s school c areer when it is desirable to form some estimate of ;the probable direction of his energies in after life. His education from then on should be given an appropriate bias. Frqm this point of view the junior high schoiol system presented valuable possibilities as a clearing-house for. the classification of individual aptitudes.

If a hundred boys want tq be carpenters and* there is 'only room in the trade for fifty, it is clear that something must be done for the other fifty if good human material is 1 to be rescued from blind alleys. That is only possible if information on the point is readily available in time to effect a readjustment of their youthful aspirations. The same'argument applies in all other d’irectiqns.

It is understood that the New Zealand Educational Institute is taking this matter up with a view to formulating suggestions for a practical scheme to effect closier c,contact between the schools and* the employers. It 'is a difficult proJbdem, but if the employers will rise to the occasion and c.o-qpeirate wi'fjh the teachers there is no re a so-p why something, should not be done to place tjhig question on a more satisfactory basis.